Business

How to Land a Job at Tumblr

Have you ever walked into work, only to find yourself surrounded by camera flashes and luminaries dressed in stylish apparel? If so, you might be a Tumblr employee during Fashion Week.

"I feel like there's always a celebrity here walking around doing interviews," says Katherine Barna, head of communications. "It's exciting, you never know who could walk through the door that day."

Famous people aside, Tumblr is a household name with a well-loved product, and especially for non-engineering roles, the company is bombarded with resumes when job openings are posted. How would one get a gig at Tumblr? In our Dream Job series, we go right to the source to find out what makes candidates stand out. Also check out our posts on Klout, Birchbox and Fab if working for those companies could be your dream job, too.

The Openings

Up until three months ago, Tumblr's biggest hiring need was for engineers. The key word was scalability, and the focus was building out the product to keep the site up and running for its users, who manage 93.4 million blogs on the platform.

"The amount of people who use Tumblr is unbelievable, and it's growing," says Sean McDermott, director of recruiting. "[We were] getting everything ready to have the bandwidth to take on that kind of traffic."

More recently, and through this next year, Tumblr's looking to expand sales, marketing and evangelism. The evangelist role is unique, even for a startup — it's someone whose job is to be embedded in a community and share the wonders of Tumblr. For anyone who loves to use Tumblr and is passionate about a certain industry, this is by all standards a dream job.

The goal, McDermott says, is to put Tumblr front of the right communities and expand relationships to make sure Tumblr is used to its furthest extent.

He explains: "It takes someone who has an intimate knowledge of that industry, someone who has a decent rolodex of contacts in that industry. If you were at a party and someone was like, I need to know who the person is to ask about restaurants here, that's the person we're looking for."

For example, David Hayes, who recently started at Tumblr as entertainment evangelist, was previously vice president of digital marketing at Lionsgate. Literary and nonprofit evangelist Rachel Fershleiser ran the Tumblr and social media at Housing Works Bookstore Cafe previously, while media evangelist Mark Coatney used to run the Tumblr at Newsweek. The evangelist position Tumblr hopes to fill next is the health and fitness evangelist.

On the engineering side, Tumblr is looking for talent to build out the site's search function. McDermott says they have five search engineers at the moment and are looking to hire a couple more, as search is a big initiative in the next year.

Most positions are in the company's headquarters in New York, but it has a data center in New Jersey and user support is in Richmond, Va.

When the recruiting team reviews resumes, they're looking for someone who stands out. The good news is, there's a space on the application for the candidate's own Tumblr blog.

"You could be an engineer but have a side food blog documenting all the best places to get barbecue in Brooklyn, and I'd find that really interesting," Barna says.

Would it be a red flag if an applicant did not have his or her own Tumblr? Well, eh, actually, yes. After some prodding, McDermott admitted that it would indeed be a concern, even for positions not required to be out selling the product.

The application process begins with a few phone interviews and for engineering positions, they'll write example code through an online program before they ever set foot in the office. For brand strategists and evangelists, they'll do a 45-minute presentation, pitching Tumblr in front of a group, as part of the process.

McDermott says there are three traits he looks for in a candidate: humility, uniqueness ("We like people who are a little weird") and a "f*ck yeah" attitude.

The Ideal Candidate

Since everything at Tumblr is open source, the company attracts engineers who are into open source code and community betterment.

Another characteristic shared by Tumblr employees, as mentioned earlier, is love for the product. "A lot of people here have dozens of Tumblr accounts for different things," McDermott says. "We dont even know about half of them, but it's like, everyone is so immersed in the Tumblr universe."

Since Tumblr is based in New York, what McDermott deems a creative epicenter, he wants to find people who embody that. There is a uniqueness that makes a person a fit for Tumblr. It might have to do with the kind of code they write, knowledge of the industry vertical they're in or creative ways they go about doing things.

Perks and Company Culture

One of the most notable characteristics of Tumblr is the involvement of the company with other New York City startups. Besides being open source and investing into the developer community, Tumblr makes an effort to interact with other tech companies. One such involvement turned into an awesome perk for employees.

Sherpaa is a New York startup that offers companies what Barna calls a "doctor friend in your pocket." Tumblr was one of the first companies to test out the service. Through the app, employees can send in symptoms or a photo of an injury and get immediate feedback from a doctor or specialist, letting them know if they should go straight to the doctor's office, or if that actually isn't necessary.

Tumblr offers the typical comprehensive benefits package of tech companies, including paid premiums on medical and dental insurance. There's also yoga in the office every two weeks and if employees are in the office past 8 p.m., they are provided with a meal and car service to get home.

Also — the coffee is great. Grady's Cold Brew is delivered every week, McDermott says. The weekly meetings on Friday, in which CEO David Karp and each of the departments present what they're working on, are catered by Kitchen Surfing.

One perk McDermott is most proud of is his own creation, called Refer Madness (prounounced like "reefer").

He explains: "If you refer a friend or someone you know they get a job here you actually get a budget to work with, and you can take out the entire company or your group to a team-building event."

Employees have opted to take the team to Medieval Times, a pro wrestling event, monster truck rallys, a Nets game and Barna's favorite so far, a nail art place for holiday-themed nail art — this was not only fun for the ladies on staff, but apparently there's an active nail art community on Tumblr, so again, the theme goes back to their product and its users.

You can see the influence of the product throughout the office. The refrigerator in the kitchen is covered in original artwork, not made by the employees' kids, but rather, the users — fan art, you might say. This even pervades the office walls. Being a company that caters to creative communities in New York and worldwide, Tumblr doesn't need to purchase expensive art pieces to give its office space a certain vibe — such art creations are sent in by the appreciative people who love using Tumblr blogs.

As I left, I walked by an interview going on in the two armchairs by the door. Each of the men people being filmed had a dog in his lap — surely one of the many employee pets that are welcome in Tumblr's office.

In Their Own Words

Don't bother applying if ...

"If you aren't totally bananas about Tumblr. Like, you have to be really crazy about the platform — I feel like even the engineers and people who don’t have to sell the platform are really crazy about it, but specifically people who are on the non-engineering side, in marketing and sales, you need to just really be in love with it." — Amandalyn Ferri, community outreach

"If you’re a stickler for structure — like most startups there are a lot of changes that go on over time and especially seeing the way my role has changed, and the people on my team are able to have more time to work on things they're interested, being able to be flexible is really important. Having a goal and knowing what you want to be working on — you should be able to carve out that role for yourself." — Sarah Henochowicz, business intelligence analyst

"If you’re not open to change, if you re not open to learning new things, if youre stuck in your ways and not open to doing it any other way, you should probably not work here." — Kris Hedstrom, product engineer

The best part about working here is ...

"The amount of activities that as a company we organize to make sure people feel welcomed when they come in, whether it's Refer Madness, how we do the monthly-ish beer pong tournaments with other startups in the area, and the amount of community-based events that the strategic outreach teams plans all the time — really allow you to socialize and become friends with the people you work with." — Amandalyn Ferri, community outreach

"Being able to make a difference in the social media space, it's really exciting to have people excited about what we do here at Tumblr. Being able to be apart of that makes me feel that I'm doing something that people care about, and there are a lot of users that live and die by Tumblr so being able to help them have a better experience is what it's all about." — Sarah Henochowicz, business intelligence analyst

"You touch a lot of people — I think it's like 700,000 visitors per employee or something like that, something mindboggling. That’s probably one of the best things about working here." — Kris Hedstrom, product engineer

When I first started working here, I was surprised by ...

"I came here and I was almost taken aback by how sincerely nice every single person is. There's no snark. Also the smartest people ... these are the most competent people that I've ever encountered in my life." — Amandalyn Ferri, community outreach

"How efficient and how much every single person here gets done. Especially on the engineering side, I think everybody has very specific goals — the amount of output per person is just astronomical compared to anywhere else I've worked." — Sarah Henochowicz, business intelligence analyst

"How few egos there are here, there's not a lot of silos at Tumblr. You can talk to anyone, nobody’s going to be like, 'Well you have to talk to my boss' ... so that’s great, I haven’t really experienced that before." — Kris Hedstrom, product engineer

BONUS GALLERY: Inside Tumblr's Memetastic New York HQ

Tumblr HQ Office Tour

Tumblr HQ

The famous Tumblr sign is the first thing you'll see when you step into either floor of the office.

An Open Floorplan

There are no office spaces on either floor of Tumblr HQ. Even when CEO David Karp is working upstairs, he sits with everyone else.

Individual Desk Decor

"I need my work area at Tumblr to reflect who I am -- we're all about identity here," says editorial director and community manager Topher Chris.

Team Work

Although the floorplan is open, there are designated spaces for each team.

Tommy the Tumblr Intern

Meet Tommy, the "intern" at Tumblr's dog-friendly space. When he's not showing off (he is a former show dog) the staff says he stays busy coding.

More Desk Tchotchkes

This robot is known as "Tommy2." However, he doesn't seem to be as productive as the intern.

Avid Tumblr Users

Communications liaison Katherine Barna says that each Tumblr teammate has at least one Tumblr blog ... if not hundreds of them.

Tumblr Loves Its Artists

The book shelves are filled with published versions of blogs that got their start on the platform.

Users Love Tumblr Back

The fridge on the ninth floor kitchen is completely covered with illustrations, notes and letters sent from Tumblr users.

"We find so much cool stuff and inspiration from the Tumblr community -- there's stuff that comes across our dashboard that's so clever, or cool or beautiful," says Barna. Sometimes it leads to people coming to the office to hang out or give a talk, and other times it can end up being a part of the office decor.

Lighting is Key

Before they moved in, the staff spent a lot of time thinking about the right vibe and light for the space.

Tumblr

Each meeting room is named after a landmark in New York. Other rooms are named after the Metropolitan, Flatiron and Empire.

Still Moving

"We're getting pretty tight upstairs, so we're going to have some spaces for people to work down here as we're growing," says Barna. "This is not the prettiest look at the moment, but we're ready for more people as we hire."

Tumblr Artists

The team keeps a list of Tumblr artists whose work they intend to purchase for the office.

That list is maintained by Annie Werner, who manages outreach for the art community. According to Werner, the list is huge.

The Kegerator

Conveniently located next to the ping pong table is the kegerator, which the staff says was most recently stocked with Brooklyn beer.

Haters Gonna Hate

More Tumblr artwork on the walls.

Meeting Space

This is where weekly staff meetings are held. A big screen allows the support team -- based in Richmond, Virginia -- to Skype in.

Puzzle

Barna says this Tumblr bot puzzle could use some work, but we think that just means other work is getting done.

Bright and Cheerful Meeting Rooms

All of the meeting rooms boast cheerful colors and a lot of natural light.

Ping Pong

The staff works hard, but also plays hard. Barna says some staff members can get pretty competitive when it comes to ping pong.

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